Friday, October 14, 2011

Cookery for Little Girls/Project Gutenberg

This book has been prepared with the special purpose of assisting mothers throughout the country to train their small daughters in the art of cookery. Scarcely any child can be trusted to take a recipe and work alone, as the clearest directions need the watchful supervision of an experienced woman, who can detect the coming mistake and explain the reason for doing things in a certain way.

All children like to experiment in the kitchen, and instead of allowing them to become an annoyance, they should be so directed that their efforts will result in immediate help to the mother and prove invaluable life lessons to the little ones themselves. Nothing is really more pitiable than the helpless woman who, when occasion demands, finds herself unable to do ordinary cooking. And that young wife is blessed indeed who has been prepared for her duties in the home by a conscientious mother. Therefore let no woman think it too much trouble to teach her child the preparation of various kinds of food, impressing on her at the same time the dignity and importance of the work.

The following articles, though considerably lengthened and rearranged, were written at the request of the Editor, and ran for a year in Pictorial Review; and the encouraging letters they elicited from women and children everywhere, prompted this publication in book form. The intention has been not to make a complete manual of cookery, but instead to create interest in enough branches to enable an otherwise inexperienced person to successfully put together any good recipe. Thanks are also due for the use of material appearing in The Circle and Harper's Bazaar.Olive Hyde Foster.

Sources Of Free Books

All books are in public domain, unless indicated.

Google Book Search books are printable if switched to plain text, or page by page by right clicking on image of page(HTML mode only). *Switch to HTML(bottom of main Google Books Menu page) . **Click on the download button at link(upper right on sidebar) to download entire text in PDF.

*(10/10)This has been disabled. Hopefully the HTML button will come back. Books listed here are still linked in HTML. I have been able to change the end of the web address by hand from Text to HTML.

**(12/10)Google Books removed the PDF download button on the overview "About" book pages! To access a download, click on any page of the book to find the PDF download button in the upper right corner.

Internet Archives indexes several free book resources, has an excellent search engine, fully printable books, and an online flip-book reader with an audio reader. Readable online as plain text or as HTML(like a regular web page).

Rosetta Project groups vintage illustrated children's books by reading level, easy to read format, and has an audio reader. Not in public domain per their format. Read only, books downloadable for small fee.